(This is 2 forum posts i made that im pasting here)
I heard about the game, read about it and was pretty excited, then i saw that the demo became available for ps3 users. but i hadnt managed to get on the internet with my ps3, so i went ahead and bought a 100 ft long cat5 wire and downloaded the demo of LOTR:conquest
Then i played through the tutorial the ndid some online games and Wow, i had a blast.
But let me tell you guys about the game and what it is, its vastly similar to Battlefield but with a LOTR sauce.
You choose one of the 4 class warrior, ranger, scout or mage. Each class has its own unique feel and range of abilities.
Warrior fight with a 2hand sword, they have 3 kind of move light medium and heavy. then a modifier they can add to their wepaon by holding a key and performing one of the 3 attacks, then theres combos. they also have active blocking and lastly the yhave a throwing axe they can use to finnish off someone running away from them or whatever. the axe cannot be throw that often. Warrior have an energy bar, they get energy when they hit enemies so that they can use that modifier that makes their sword fiery their special aiblities also recquire energy. They have one that goes through blocking (its a heavy hit tho so long precast/aftercast)
Rangers fire arrows, when they hit with arrow they get energy that charges one of the 3 abilities, Multi arrow (3 arrows at once) and/or the 2 preparations poison (snare) or fire (KD). basically you fire hit one of your preparation and you bow becomes green or orange, then you fire an arrow and it does the desired effect. ranger dont have much defense except an ability to kick enemy from melee range which moves them away and gives you some breathing room.
Scout are like assassins, they have a cloak that makes them as invis as the ut2k3/2k4 invis adren combo did. and when they manage to sneak up behind someone they can 1 hit kill them(dont worry its gay but its not That easy to pull off) then they ahve 3 attacks like the warriors, but they arent as effective for aoe and then they have a satchel bag they can throw. as for the other class they need to fight to get their energy for the stealthing, satchel and whatever else they got (i havent played that class much)
lastly Mage, Mage fire lightning at enemies, they can charge it to more dmg or simply fire single bolts. thats what gives the mtheir energy to use their aoe heal (Similar to the aoc big heals from priests) their energy is also useful for their fireball attack which fires a fireball that explode and does aoe dmg or their Repulse like thing thats a aoe KD (awesome againsts scouts) they also get a blocking shield when they hold the active blcoking key, basically they are in a bubble that protects everyone in it from all ranged dmg, the bad thing about that is that you cannot run, only walk, and youre not invulnerable to KD.
Thats it for the classes, now what you do with them is exactly like weve seen in battlefield, theres capture points on the map and you stand near them to capture them, and it gives your team point, once you get max point you win, the simple but so effective recipe for good times. i also saw that there was other things in maps but i havent really got a chance to experience with them, but it seems like you can control trolls and or the tree guys or ride mounts and fight from them. i was playing a orc mage once and was assiting a troll on my team from a distance and i saw a good guy warrior climb the bakc of the troll and starting hitting it hard but i managed to kill him fast enough
The game is just awesome, its the kind of feel Aoc shouldve given me but failed miserably. theres alot of action, alot of teamwork, its accessible but has the ability to be more complex. and its seems decently balanced as far as classes go cause each one has a little something to give to their team.
I also like how it fixes problems with for example, battlefield games. for example you cant fire from a really far range wit hyour arrows or your lightning bolts. so the gay sniper hiding in a mountain and thats impossible to find from bf vietnam doesnt exist. then theres not that many headshots, except the scout thing. but like i said the scout will have trouble to do it to any moderately aware person. theres also teh trolls and trees that hit pretty hard but mage arent meant to tank giant trees. on theo ther hand warrior can stand closer and survive if they are not alone. all it takes really is a bit of focus fire. lastly what i noticed is that since its all close ot medium range combat, sure you need t oaim and target your stuff, but not That much and it doesnt take much practice to be able to be accurate with a ranger or a mage.
I dont know how the gameplay will translate on a mouse and keyboard but its definitely great for consoles (its also playable in 4way splitscreen i believe, if not only 2). i hope they release a demo for pc so i can test it. but so far im certain to buy it for ps3
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i just spent some time reading on the lotrc forums to hear the feedback other players gave to the game.
there was alot of negative stuff that people found about the game and so i decided to refutate some of it here because i thought the game was awesome
first people are saying the mp maps are too small and too cramped. well you can only play it 8v8 so it makes alot of sense that you dont have HUUUUUUUUUGE maps. the maps are 8v8 size and they have certain areas you can walk on and certain paths you can take instead of being a really open world. thats good cause it creates choke points and area you want to control to win. it creates large struggles to control a zone instead of having bunch of people chase each other in circles to cap points.
theres also complaints about the classes imbalance, well i heard people complaining about each class so i guess they all have their things and are balanced in that way. but more seriously, i liked how everyclass had their thing and had to work with other classes to win games while not being helpless in certain situations. For example the warrior class isnt that good against a bunch of ranged classes, so sometimes youll see a mage with his bubble walk with a warrior until he gets a better position to start attacking enemies. but thats a rather sucky tactic if you ask me cause you dont have that kind of time and warriors have better options like their throwing axe they can throw an axe at the enemy and if it hits, the enemy is knocked down, not only is that good defensively to help a teammate but its pretty darn good to get in striking position with the enemy. and then wit htheir energy move, warriors have that Falcon kick type thing which is just like Falcon kick, while it doesnt charge you forward that far, its can be enough.
Rangers with their snare and KD are good at keeping their enemies at a distance, but when they are within melee range its hard to fight, thankfully they have their kick to KD enemies away.
Mages, people are complaining about magic in the game and all. but the game is not really a lotr simulation, its a fun mp game. and mage fits really well in there. their lightning bolts needs to be charged to be really strong, their fireball have to be aimed in an arch so its hard to aim (but it creates an aoe fire circle for a few seconds that can shut down a path a little) their melee attack is good because its done with a pole and the pole has a wide hit radius similar to guardians in AoC. but the pole does very little damage. the shockwave isnt too OP either to get rid of meleers because theres a like a 1/2 second precast on it so you have to use like a protective prayer in GW and not just a Panic button.
Scout can cloak but you can always see their silouhette, i find em kinda weak compared to the others but since they can one shot well whoever wants to play em may go ahead, it just doesnt seem particularly useful to me. oh and they have their satchel bomb as some kind of ranged attack as well as left or right roll to evade stuff.
oh and i forgot warriors active blocking is kinda hard to use online but it might just be me who is bad. ive used it effectively offline tho to tank big mobs. once you go in active blocking mode you can move the directions to dodge forward backward left or right. so all defensive moves are combined unlike AoC.
people are also complaining about how you get knocked off mounts too easely. it takes only 1 hit or 1 arrow to be knocked off your mount. i find that great because it doenst give a ridiculously big advantage to the people on mounts. besides when youre on a mount you can kd with your sword almost anyone that comes inyour range. its really effective to disperse a big mob just like what they intended to do with mounted combat in aoc but we all know that mounted combat in aoc sucked ass.it sucks tho that theres no mounted archery, it woudlve been cool but it doesnt really matter because aiming while riding a horse is almost impossible.
Hero playable characters can be obtained in mp games to give your team some kind of boosts. top scorer on the team gets asked if he wants to control a hero and he then has the control of a hero character that has alot more health than normal and hits really hard and based on the nature of how you get that character, its being played by the toughest guy on the other team. i found that a little op but pretty cool nonetheless. the heros are still killable.
i found troll and ents you can control pretty gay too because they 1 hit kill pretty much everything they manage to hit (Except warriors, they take 2 hit) they are not all that easy to control but they still take quite a bit of effort from the other team to take them down. the biggest problem i have with them is that they have a heal over time abilit yto heal themselves while the ystand still and use that. sure its a slow heal, but i dont think they should get it. Another thing worth noting is that the ents get on fire if you use the fireball or the fire arrows against them so they die faster than the trolls. but oyu know, trolls and ents arent all that OP if you have good scouts cause they can 1 hit kill them if they managed to sneak up and climb behind them and chop their head or whatever. (looks pretty cool too)
another thing that was kinda stupid but is really minor is that you die if you go in water. as if you fell off a ledge. and theres a river on a map with a small bridge. like i said tho when speaking about map size thats fine that you cant go in water but id opt for the invisble wall instead of you die when you touch water. thats a minor thing tho and i have yet to get knocked down or anything in water.
i dont think i saw any other reasonable complaint about the gameplay while reading through the feedback thread. then some people are sayign the graphics sucks and all, and for that game i really could care less mostly because id rather have those huge battles with 150ish npc on the map in sp mode instead of a really lagged battle. also not opting for for the best graphics psosible allows for split screen coop play, and if you have a look at the graphics really it looks mighty fine.
The only thing im hoping is that theres more skins per class in the retail game. i know it wil lchange depending on the maps. but id like to be able to have a choice of appearance for my class. as it is right now your class gets assigned a skin depending on the map so tehres like 3 good ranger skin, but you can only be the hobbit ones when youre on the Shire map. but then again this is only visual and doesnt impair gameplay.
to conclude, im really excited about the game because of that feeling it gives me when i play it. a feeling that ive been looking for for a loooong time.
Saturday, December 27, 2008
Friday, December 12, 2008
torture in WoW
I just read about many WoW players being outraged by a torture quest in WoW on this site: http://www.jeuxvideo.com/news/2008/00030670-des-scenes-de-torture-dans-world-of-warcraft.htm (sorry for you non french speakers, the link is in french)
Basically the quest consist of using an item on a defenseless prisoner to get him to speak, the prisoner then spam the chat with complaints and eventually gives you the information you needed to get from him.
So now many many people are deeply shocked by this and probably want something done? remove or modify the quest? change the rating on WoW? I dont know, but i do think that being upset by that quest is just counterproductive.
Basically the quest consist of using an item on a defenseless prisoner to get him to speak, the prisoner then spam the chat with complaints and eventually gives you the information you needed to get from him.
So now many many people are deeply shocked by this and probably want something done? remove or modify the quest? change the rating on WoW? I dont know, but i do think that being upset by that quest is just counterproductive.
Monday, December 1, 2008
ultimate low for selfishness
I heard in the news several months ago that there was a bomb alert in India during a big religious gathering. The panicked crowd of several thousands pious indians rushed the exits in an attempt to save their lives. In the end there was no bomb, but several people died after being trampled by the mass of people trying to get out of the area.
Now while that event is really sad because several people died while there was no real bomb threat, we can still understand the panic wave that struck the crowd as they thought their lives were in danger. It became a huge free-for-all and everybody tried their best to save their own lives.
last week during the "Black friday" in the united states, a wal-mart employee died after being trampled on by the crowd of people waiting in line to take advantages of the great savings. As the guy opened the doors at 5 am, everybody rushed in and he was caught under the steps of all the shoppers, several other employees tried to rescue him but they were trampled too, other people were taken to the hospital for minor injuries. When they announced they were gonna close to the store because someone died, people complained that they had been waiting in line sine thursday and kept shopping.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20081129/ap_on_re_us/wal_mart_death_13
That is just retarded how crazy people to get to save money and buy many things that they dont really need to survive. Someone died and nobody cared about it and just kept on shopping and were mad that they would close down the stores. how can they be so careless? I'd like to think that a human life is worth more than a 798$ plasma TV.
This is not w/o mentionning other similar events that happened in the united states over the last year. like that old lady that passed out on the floor in a hospital waiting room and nobody went to check to see if she was and she was pronounced dead like 6 hours after she had been "sleeping" there.
Or what about the guy that got hit by a car and the car just left w/o stopping, then the bloodied bod yremained on the street for 30 minutes while cars were dodging it and pedestrians looked at the guy w/o stopping. It went on until a police car happened to be driving in the area and came upon the body and stopped. becuase they didnt get called there, they just happened to drive on that boulevard.
I dont know how many other events like this there are, but this is too much
Now while that event is really sad because several people died while there was no real bomb threat, we can still understand the panic wave that struck the crowd as they thought their lives were in danger. It became a huge free-for-all and everybody tried their best to save their own lives.
last week during the "Black friday" in the united states, a wal-mart employee died after being trampled on by the crowd of people waiting in line to take advantages of the great savings. As the guy opened the doors at 5 am, everybody rushed in and he was caught under the steps of all the shoppers, several other employees tried to rescue him but they were trampled too, other people were taken to the hospital for minor injuries. When they announced they were gonna close to the store because someone died, people complained that they had been waiting in line sine thursday and kept shopping.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20081129/ap_on_re_us/wal_mart_death_13
That is just retarded how crazy people to get to save money and buy many things that they dont really need to survive. Someone died and nobody cared about it and just kept on shopping and were mad that they would close down the stores. how can they be so careless? I'd like to think that a human life is worth more than a 798$ plasma TV.
This is not w/o mentionning other similar events that happened in the united states over the last year. like that old lady that passed out on the floor in a hospital waiting room and nobody went to check to see if she was and she was pronounced dead like 6 hours after she had been "sleeping" there.
Or what about the guy that got hit by a car and the car just left w/o stopping, then the bloodied bod yremained on the street for 30 minutes while cars were dodging it and pedestrians looked at the guy w/o stopping. It went on until a police car happened to be driving in the area and came upon the body and stopped. becuase they didnt get called there, they just happened to drive on that boulevard.
I dont know how many other events like this there are, but this is too much
Saturday, October 25, 2008
Getting rid of all slides to block shots/intercept passes in hockey
I recently heard that Bob Gainey suggested to the other NHL GMs that defensemen shouldnt be allowed to dive on the ice to block a shot or intercepting a pass otherwise they would get a penalty. That means all players shoudl be standing up at all time and only use their body/stick to take away the puck.
this is the most stupid suggestion i ever heard. It means putting more rules into the game to make less accessible and more compliated to play where plaeyrs cant do anything on the ice and have to htink of so many rules. hockey's strenght use to be cause it didnt have that many rules altering gameplay. players just did what they needed to do to score a goal. it gave alot of room for defensive play making it important to be good at both ends of the ice to win. taking away all dives and slides would dumb down hockey.
It would also means a ton more penalty and we all know how much a player advantage can influence your chance to score a goal on both ends. i think theres too many powerplays currently but its bearable.
When i watch a hockey game, i watch goals and shoots, but i spend alot of time looking at defensive play and positioning cause its interesting to see what players are doing to score a goal or to avoid being scored on. the game is not only about scoring goals its about working your way toward the net to do it. but i guess the masses just dont understand that and want to see goals.
So im just crossing my fingers that this change never happens cause this is when i will stop watching hockey
this is the most stupid suggestion i ever heard. It means putting more rules into the game to make less accessible and more compliated to play where plaeyrs cant do anything on the ice and have to htink of so many rules. hockey's strenght use to be cause it didnt have that many rules altering gameplay. players just did what they needed to do to score a goal. it gave alot of room for defensive play making it important to be good at both ends of the ice to win. taking away all dives and slides would dumb down hockey.
It would also means a ton more penalty and we all know how much a player advantage can influence your chance to score a goal on both ends. i think theres too many powerplays currently but its bearable.
When i watch a hockey game, i watch goals and shoots, but i spend alot of time looking at defensive play and positioning cause its interesting to see what players are doing to score a goal or to avoid being scored on. the game is not only about scoring goals its about working your way toward the net to do it. but i guess the masses just dont understand that and want to see goals.
So im just crossing my fingers that this change never happens cause this is when i will stop watching hockey
Tuesday, October 14, 2008
rank 15 in Guildwars
I will try to explain to the neophytes what this is and what it represents
In guildwars you can participate in a 8v8 tournament that goes on all the time 24/7. you face something like 6 different stages to eventually get to the hall of heroes where you compete against 2 other teams to win the control of the hall of heroes, at that point you face other teams coming to challenge your position and you can be there for as long as you can keep winning games.
Winning in hero's ascent rewards you with fame points which are used to level up in the ranks of Hero, 185 fame gives you rank 3 and your first emote which is a deer, rank 6 is 1000 fame and is a tiger and theres other emotes for rank 9 and 12. rank 10 is 7750 fame, as you can see the fame recquirement rise pretty damn fast and it gets much harder to gain ranks at the higher levels.
The game has been out since 2004 and until then there was nobody with r15, (100 000 fame) and for a long time nobody with rank 13 and 14 (in fact i didnt know anyone was r14 (60 000 fame)until i saw this video showing the r15 emote http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=GUeVs70UKVw)
so everyone that has been through elementary school knows that 7750 is much lower than 100 000 and getting r15 already seems like a big accomplishment but let me present you this in another way
You earn 1 fame if you win 1 game in heroes ascent, that number rises with consecutives wins, if you lose you get kicked out of the tournament and the counter restarts. the number of fame you get is 2 if you win 2 games, 3 for 3, 4 for 4 then it starts rising faster and eventually you get to the maximum which is 40 (after 13 wins in a row) for every win after 13 you get 40 fame.
but you have to win those 13 games and the competition in HA is very strong so getting there and staying there is already a huge accomplishment in itself
so getting 100 000 fame represents a lot of wins because its unlikely the guy could get to the 40 fame per win cap everytime he tried. very unlikely, so unlikely that i have no clue how to guess a number for that
lets look at it from my perspective, im a pretty good GW players, ive been playing for over 30 months, im a rank 5 with 786 fame. I never won the hall of heroes and i dont think i ever won more than 4 or 5 games in a row and that is playing with fairly decent teams most of the time (i didnt get much into the higher ranks restricted groups because of lower rank)
seeing that this person won 100 000 fame and got the rank 15 is an incredible accomplishment not only in terms of ridiculous amount of time spent playing but also cause it needed to be done while performing really well.
In guildwars you can participate in a 8v8 tournament that goes on all the time 24/7. you face something like 6 different stages to eventually get to the hall of heroes where you compete against 2 other teams to win the control of the hall of heroes, at that point you face other teams coming to challenge your position and you can be there for as long as you can keep winning games.
Winning in hero's ascent rewards you with fame points which are used to level up in the ranks of Hero, 185 fame gives you rank 3 and your first emote which is a deer, rank 6 is 1000 fame and is a tiger and theres other emotes for rank 9 and 12. rank 10 is 7750 fame, as you can see the fame recquirement rise pretty damn fast and it gets much harder to gain ranks at the higher levels.
The game has been out since 2004 and until then there was nobody with r15, (100 000 fame) and for a long time nobody with rank 13 and 14 (in fact i didnt know anyone was r14 (60 000 fame)until i saw this video showing the r15 emote http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=GUeVs70UKVw)
so everyone that has been through elementary school knows that 7750 is much lower than 100 000 and getting r15 already seems like a big accomplishment but let me present you this in another way
You earn 1 fame if you win 1 game in heroes ascent, that number rises with consecutives wins, if you lose you get kicked out of the tournament and the counter restarts. the number of fame you get is 2 if you win 2 games, 3 for 3, 4 for 4 then it starts rising faster and eventually you get to the maximum which is 40 (after 13 wins in a row) for every win after 13 you get 40 fame.
but you have to win those 13 games and the competition in HA is very strong so getting there and staying there is already a huge accomplishment in itself
so getting 100 000 fame represents a lot of wins because its unlikely the guy could get to the 40 fame per win cap everytime he tried. very unlikely, so unlikely that i have no clue how to guess a number for that
lets look at it from my perspective, im a pretty good GW players, ive been playing for over 30 months, im a rank 5 with 786 fame. I never won the hall of heroes and i dont think i ever won more than 4 or 5 games in a row and that is playing with fairly decent teams most of the time (i didnt get much into the higher ranks restricted groups because of lower rank)
seeing that this person won 100 000 fame and got the rank 15 is an incredible accomplishment not only in terms of ridiculous amount of time spent playing but also cause it needed to be done while performing really well.
Thursday, October 2, 2008
Darkfall Online
Many players are really tired of playing WoW and are looking for something fresh and new. This is why the expectations for Vanguard: Saga of Heroes were that high. A game that was gonna be really vast and suited for hardcore players. But the game was horribly designed and was really far from what it was advertising. As a result only a handful of players are playing VG now while over 200 thousand quit within the first 3 months. And so time went on and the amount of players wanting a change from WoW grew. Lets precise that its not only wow players that are looking for a new good game, Since i believe Ultima Online there was no game for hardcore players, no game with good Free for all settings and corpse looting and other hardcore features. Them paired with players from other games and mostly the huge wave of players that got introduced to mmos by WoW as well as other people from all horizons makes a pretty huge chunk of players. So they heard that Age of Conan was in development a game with supposedly revolutionary combat and gameplay. While AoC has several good aspects, good graphics, animations, outstanding sound and music. the guys that designed the classes and abilities was really stupid and the game was really unfun to play and lacked several of its advertised feature. People were and are being patient with AoC but they failed and are still failing to deliver what they promised and people get tired of waiting and quit. this is why AoC lost close to half its subscriber base after 3 months (possibly more than that, but all we have is the number Funcom had at the end of july or something like that). Meanwhile, several other mmos tried to copy the wow formula in an attempt to make something better and new like Lord of the rings online, Star Wars Galaxies and the Game enchancements, etc etc. But everytime they failed miserably because while they had a little something of their own to bring to the table, they were not as detailed and polished as WoW.
So its in this context that a game that has been in development for 7 years and didnt get much attention at all is now intriguing many players: Darkfall Online. Darkfall is being developped by a small studio in greece caleld Adventurine. they are being helped by norwegians and swiss developpers. After i read the list of features and saw their long gameplay trailer, I came to the conclusion that DF is a really ambitious project. it seems like they nailed down well what they needed to put in a game to make it good now all they need to do is do it. If they manage like to put everything in there. then we will have a really great game. Things like the ability to create and change your class to your taste anytime you want minus some time levelling, item decay to create a world economy, skill based gameplay, destructible player cities, naval combat etc etc (i dont know them all). But the pressure is high on them because the game looks horrible graphically and animation wise so that is not what will draw players. We also have the right to be afraid that despite teh bad graphics the game will recquire pretty high system recquirements due to the fact that its a small studio. so while the game looks like it would be good in 2003 it might need a 2007 machine to play well but we will see how that goes cause we can always be surprised.
So let us hope the game runs smoothly on older machines so that way the target audience is larger and let us also hope that the game delivers all its advertised feature and we might Finally have something unique Post-WoW that will be worth playing. But I'm skeptical they will pull it off so I'm still looking forward Guildwars 2 and the Star Wars Galaxies pre-combat upgrade emulator.
So its in this context that a game that has been in development for 7 years and didnt get much attention at all is now intriguing many players: Darkfall Online. Darkfall is being developped by a small studio in greece caleld Adventurine. they are being helped by norwegians and swiss developpers. After i read the list of features and saw their long gameplay trailer, I came to the conclusion that DF is a really ambitious project. it seems like they nailed down well what they needed to put in a game to make it good now all they need to do is do it. If they manage like to put everything in there. then we will have a really great game. Things like the ability to create and change your class to your taste anytime you want minus some time levelling, item decay to create a world economy, skill based gameplay, destructible player cities, naval combat etc etc (i dont know them all). But the pressure is high on them because the game looks horrible graphically and animation wise so that is not what will draw players. We also have the right to be afraid that despite teh bad graphics the game will recquire pretty high system recquirements due to the fact that its a small studio. so while the game looks like it would be good in 2003 it might need a 2007 machine to play well but we will see how that goes cause we can always be surprised.
So let us hope the game runs smoothly on older machines so that way the target audience is larger and let us also hope that the game delivers all its advertised feature and we might Finally have something unique Post-WoW that will be worth playing. But I'm skeptical they will pull it off so I'm still looking forward Guildwars 2 and the Star Wars Galaxies pre-combat upgrade emulator.
Friday, September 26, 2008
shivers while listening to music
My friend sent me a Metallica song yesterday called Mercenaries. He asked me what I thought of it and after listening to it one time I told him that it didn't appeal to me much. Then he told me that he thought it was a masterpiece and that he got shivers when he listening to it trying to figure what every member of the band is doing to create this unisson. Now that really caught my attention because I knew exactly what he was talking about, sometimes you get shivers listening to a really good song but this time I think we can tell why: It's partly when you try to listen to every details of every second of a song and what it creates.
heres an example: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AQWKUXtzTug (dont pay attention to the video it sucks)
But we all know that a song doesn't need to give you shivers to be good, in my case theres plenty of songs that just kinda move me like this for example http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FOH6UHY_ELk (as for most electronic songs, you'll have to be patient to truly let it build up and appreciate it)
heres an example: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AQWKUXtzTug (dont pay attention to the video it sucks)
But we all know that a song doesn't need to give you shivers to be good, in my case theres plenty of songs that just kinda move me like this for example http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FOH6UHY_ELk (as for most electronic songs, you'll have to be patient to truly let it build up and appreciate it)
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
The Canadiens in Roberval
Tonight the Canadiens are playing the Sabres in Roberval for a pre-season match.
Roberval is a small town of roughly 10 000 inhabitants, its not that small, but the fact that its so far from montreal (roughly 5h30 drive) and thus 5h30 from any large city makes it a small town.
Couple years ago, they decided to create some kind of ice town, which was basically a small village on ice, with small houses, ice paths to move around the town and some ice rinks to chill. the whole concept was just to have some cool place to go ice skating with friends and have a good time socializing and chilling, literally. Then there was a contest across canada to determine which city was Hockeyville, the winner would get the opporunity to host a nhl pre-season match. Roberval along with roughly 1100 other cities submited its application. The ice town charmed the judges cause of its unique concept. After a large vote on the internet to determine a winner, Roberval was crowned Hockeyville and is now getting to host a pre-season game.
Their arena has 1237 seats and is pretty far from being up to the standards of the NHL as far as being able to host medias and accomodate players. but the city has been working on that since april to try and do their best for tonight's game, which will be on TV.
This doenst seem like something all that major. but it is, for people that are located really far from most major cities, almost disconnected from the rest of the world(except for the internet and the television) its a unique opportunity to see, their hockey team, some of their idols, for the first time in person, to be part of a large special event that will probably never happen again. I'm really happy for the residents of Roberval who get the privilege to host a nhl pre-season game.
Roberval is a small town of roughly 10 000 inhabitants, its not that small, but the fact that its so far from montreal (roughly 5h30 drive) and thus 5h30 from any large city makes it a small town.
Couple years ago, they decided to create some kind of ice town, which was basically a small village on ice, with small houses, ice paths to move around the town and some ice rinks to chill. the whole concept was just to have some cool place to go ice skating with friends and have a good time socializing and chilling, literally. Then there was a contest across canada to determine which city was Hockeyville, the winner would get the opporunity to host a nhl pre-season match. Roberval along with roughly 1100 other cities submited its application. The ice town charmed the judges cause of its unique concept. After a large vote on the internet to determine a winner, Roberval was crowned Hockeyville and is now getting to host a pre-season game.
Their arena has 1237 seats and is pretty far from being up to the standards of the NHL as far as being able to host medias and accomodate players. but the city has been working on that since april to try and do their best for tonight's game, which will be on TV.
This doenst seem like something all that major. but it is, for people that are located really far from most major cities, almost disconnected from the rest of the world(except for the internet and the television) its a unique opportunity to see, their hockey team, some of their idols, for the first time in person, to be part of a large special event that will probably never happen again. I'm really happy for the residents of Roberval who get the privilege to host a nhl pre-season game.
Saturday, September 13, 2008
NHL 09 first look
I had a first look at NHL 09 on the PS3 yesterday and I was really impressed with what they have done with the game. Like they said on the nhl 09 website "The best just got better"
Their goal with nhl 08 was to make the game feel more natural to play by using the 2 analog sticks to shoot, create cool dekes and really allow the player to feel like he was controlling his player. They did that well and NHL 08 succeeded at what it wanted to do, it was really cool. The problem tho was that it was a really offensive game, where it was easy to score goals, get away from defensemen and do outstanding moves to score some really nice goals... in bulk.
NHL 09 improved that feel too with the new protect the puck feature where if you hold a button while skating you get in a good defensive position where its harder for enemy defensemen to steal the puck from you.
But nhl 09 main focus was defensive play where their really improved and made feel more natural. Its pretty hard to enter the offensive zone in the center and get a clear shot in the slot now. In fact, its hard to do anything offensively if youre not playing it like you should.
I want to also remind that nhl 09 plays with the 2 analog sticks and the L1 L2 R1 R2 buttons while protect puck is on X, the only button youll use for gameplay movement. That means your 2 thumbs are always on the analogs while your 2 indexes control the other moves (pass, dump puck, skate backward, glide) the only time your finger will be on another button is when you wanna protect the puck, making it so that if you want to shoot from a defensive position youll have to stop holding the button. X is also used to lift the opponent stick to try and steal the puck because every button has a With the puck and Without the puck function. Shooting is done by tapping the right analog, and holding it back for a bit then tapping it for a slapshot (you take your swing to slam the puck hard). The other L and R buttons are pretty easy to pickup. R2 is passing or change players. R1 is to use your stick to sweep the ice if you do it while moving the analog or clear the puck, which you can do effectively too (clearing the puck was always a tactic in nhl games, but this time it actually works because you can slowly flip the puck into a corner of the ice rink and forecheck toward that direction). L2 is skating backward, so if you hold that button and move the analog stick backward, you will certainly start skating backward but that will only be useful if you wanna add that to your offensive arsenal or want to get more control on your player because the game is good enough to now when you should skate backward while defending on the rush and it will make you skate backward automatically. L1 is glide, you use it to slow down your skating speed and just glide, it can be useful when youre at the point trying to get in a good position for a big slapshot. Without the puck L1 is used to get in a position to block shots or pass, and you can move with the analog too. Then if youre in a moment of panic you can always hold L1 and R1 at the same time to dive. Last but no the least, you check by tapping the right analog stick forward when youre without the puck, checking players is tough and as rewarding as ever in nhl 09.
Thats alot of text about controls, but the game feels and plays really naturally and is easy to pick up, then tis hard or impossible to master since youll always do small mistakes but the important thing is that its really fun and feels like hockey.
I havent seen much of the rest, the Dynasty mode seemed very similar to nhl 08's (which was already impressive) but the create-a-player was massively improved. even if its not as customizable as before (you dont have tons of sliders for jaws, chin, mouth, etc etc that allwos you millions of possibilities to make hundreds of characters that all look the same) they cut that down alot and made the character appearance simpler, you choose face form, skin tone, then hair color, eye color and other things like that. but that is not where the character creation strenght lies. This time you can actually choose your equipment which stick you want to use (theres like 30 different sticks, and they are the real ones) and you can select the type of curve you want on your stick to be better with wrist shots, slap shots or an balanced stick. then you have a selection of skates with blade lenght, shorter blades are better for agility but you have less speed, then a more balanced, and long blade for more speed and acceleration. You can choose if you want to tuck your jersey in your pants or no, if you want your socks over your skates or under. Then you get to the skills sliders where you decide how you want to set your attributes on your player, They brought back the Offensive awareness and Defensive awareness sliders to really give your player a personality on the ice. Once youre done, you can go test your player on the ice.
You also have the option to do team practices, practice different scenarios 1 on 0, 1 on 1, 2 on 0 etc etc. practice power play and penalty killing. me and my friend actually spent 2 hours in practice mode just chilling and toying with the controls before doing an actual game, and it was fun.
To conclude, even if i only played a couple hours with nhl 09, I am really impressed, I have never seen a hockey game so complete, and I'm wondering what theyll do in nhl 2010. The only thing I didn't like of it was the music, EA sports usually gets the right ot use 15-20 songs every year and just use those and clips of those for the entire game. They could improve the music clips used after scoring a goal or anytime during a faceoff to make it more realistic and for that I will give NHL 08 only a 9.7/10
Their goal with nhl 08 was to make the game feel more natural to play by using the 2 analog sticks to shoot, create cool dekes and really allow the player to feel like he was controlling his player. They did that well and NHL 08 succeeded at what it wanted to do, it was really cool. The problem tho was that it was a really offensive game, where it was easy to score goals, get away from defensemen and do outstanding moves to score some really nice goals... in bulk.
NHL 09 improved that feel too with the new protect the puck feature where if you hold a button while skating you get in a good defensive position where its harder for enemy defensemen to steal the puck from you.
But nhl 09 main focus was defensive play where their really improved and made feel more natural. Its pretty hard to enter the offensive zone in the center and get a clear shot in the slot now. In fact, its hard to do anything offensively if youre not playing it like you should.
I want to also remind that nhl 09 plays with the 2 analog sticks and the L1 L2 R1 R2 buttons while protect puck is on X, the only button youll use for gameplay movement. That means your 2 thumbs are always on the analogs while your 2 indexes control the other moves (pass, dump puck, skate backward, glide) the only time your finger will be on another button is when you wanna protect the puck, making it so that if you want to shoot from a defensive position youll have to stop holding the button. X is also used to lift the opponent stick to try and steal the puck because every button has a With the puck and Without the puck function. Shooting is done by tapping the right analog, and holding it back for a bit then tapping it for a slapshot (you take your swing to slam the puck hard). The other L and R buttons are pretty easy to pickup. R2 is passing or change players. R1 is to use your stick to sweep the ice if you do it while moving the analog or clear the puck, which you can do effectively too (clearing the puck was always a tactic in nhl games, but this time it actually works because you can slowly flip the puck into a corner of the ice rink and forecheck toward that direction). L2 is skating backward, so if you hold that button and move the analog stick backward, you will certainly start skating backward but that will only be useful if you wanna add that to your offensive arsenal or want to get more control on your player because the game is good enough to now when you should skate backward while defending on the rush and it will make you skate backward automatically. L1 is glide, you use it to slow down your skating speed and just glide, it can be useful when youre at the point trying to get in a good position for a big slapshot. Without the puck L1 is used to get in a position to block shots or pass, and you can move with the analog too. Then if youre in a moment of panic you can always hold L1 and R1 at the same time to dive. Last but no the least, you check by tapping the right analog stick forward when youre without the puck, checking players is tough and as rewarding as ever in nhl 09.
Thats alot of text about controls, but the game feels and plays really naturally and is easy to pick up, then tis hard or impossible to master since youll always do small mistakes but the important thing is that its really fun and feels like hockey.
I havent seen much of the rest, the Dynasty mode seemed very similar to nhl 08's (which was already impressive) but the create-a-player was massively improved. even if its not as customizable as before (you dont have tons of sliders for jaws, chin, mouth, etc etc that allwos you millions of possibilities to make hundreds of characters that all look the same) they cut that down alot and made the character appearance simpler, you choose face form, skin tone, then hair color, eye color and other things like that. but that is not where the character creation strenght lies. This time you can actually choose your equipment which stick you want to use (theres like 30 different sticks, and they are the real ones) and you can select the type of curve you want on your stick to be better with wrist shots, slap shots or an balanced stick. then you have a selection of skates with blade lenght, shorter blades are better for agility but you have less speed, then a more balanced, and long blade for more speed and acceleration. You can choose if you want to tuck your jersey in your pants or no, if you want your socks over your skates or under. Then you get to the skills sliders where you decide how you want to set your attributes on your player, They brought back the Offensive awareness and Defensive awareness sliders to really give your player a personality on the ice. Once youre done, you can go test your player on the ice.
You also have the option to do team practices, practice different scenarios 1 on 0, 1 on 1, 2 on 0 etc etc. practice power play and penalty killing. me and my friend actually spent 2 hours in practice mode just chilling and toying with the controls before doing an actual game, and it was fun.
To conclude, even if i only played a couple hours with nhl 09, I am really impressed, I have never seen a hockey game so complete, and I'm wondering what theyll do in nhl 2010. The only thing I didn't like of it was the music, EA sports usually gets the right ot use 15-20 songs every year and just use those and clips of those for the entire game. They could improve the music clips used after scoring a goal or anytime during a faceoff to make it more realistic and for that I will give NHL 08 only a 9.7/10
Friday, September 12, 2008
Montreal traded for Robert Lang
While I see the acquisition of Robert as a good one, how the hell does Bob Gainey always manage to get the same kind of players on his team to play center for the 3rd line.
Few years ago we had Radek Bonk, a center that could play really well when given the ice time and the task to score. Radek bonk played center with Daniel Alfredson on his wing and was able to score about 75 points in a season (im not sure if thats correct information but it was a good scoring production). When Bonk joined the Canadiens, he immediately slowed down by a ton in his offensive production obviously he was playing a much different role with the Canadiens, but we just couldnt count on him to score some points at all. On the other hand he did play really well on the penalty kill and was appreciated by the crowd for that.
Last year we signed Bryan Smolinski to replace the loss of Bonk. Smolinski had some good seasons of over 50 points when he was given the proper ice time and good wingers. Once he was in montreal he just completely shut down too and was unable to do anything on offense.
I fear this is the same that will happen with Robert Lang, we will expect him to be able to score alot of points (he had a season of 80 points with the Penguins, and some pretty good years with the Red Wings) but I'm expecting him to slow down alot on offense. Let's just see how he can play on the penalty kill because last year, even if Bryan Smolinski one of our best guy for faceoffs, he didn't quite replace Bonk in the penalty killing role. If Lang can play really well defensively then it should be worth the money.
These 3 centers are just all very similar to me, they are the kind of guys that can play good, but shine a lot if they are paired with really good wingers. They are not the kind of players that will make the others around them shine.
But I've been compairing Lang to the other 2 already, almost forgotting that this year might be a different scenario since with the acquisition of Alex Tanguay we have one other really talented player that we can use to create various line combos and perhaps one will allow Lang to play with some really talented players and be able to make his line the second line.
My prediction for Robert lang this year is that he will score around 30 to 40 points
Few years ago we had Radek Bonk, a center that could play really well when given the ice time and the task to score. Radek bonk played center with Daniel Alfredson on his wing and was able to score about 75 points in a season (im not sure if thats correct information but it was a good scoring production). When Bonk joined the Canadiens, he immediately slowed down by a ton in his offensive production obviously he was playing a much different role with the Canadiens, but we just couldnt count on him to score some points at all. On the other hand he did play really well on the penalty kill and was appreciated by the crowd for that.
Last year we signed Bryan Smolinski to replace the loss of Bonk. Smolinski had some good seasons of over 50 points when he was given the proper ice time and good wingers. Once he was in montreal he just completely shut down too and was unable to do anything on offense.
I fear this is the same that will happen with Robert Lang, we will expect him to be able to score alot of points (he had a season of 80 points with the Penguins, and some pretty good years with the Red Wings) but I'm expecting him to slow down alot on offense. Let's just see how he can play on the penalty kill because last year, even if Bryan Smolinski one of our best guy for faceoffs, he didn't quite replace Bonk in the penalty killing role. If Lang can play really well defensively then it should be worth the money.
These 3 centers are just all very similar to me, they are the kind of guys that can play good, but shine a lot if they are paired with really good wingers. They are not the kind of players that will make the others around them shine.
But I've been compairing Lang to the other 2 already, almost forgotting that this year might be a different scenario since with the acquisition of Alex Tanguay we have one other really talented player that we can use to create various line combos and perhaps one will allow Lang to play with some really talented players and be able to make his line the second line.
My prediction for Robert lang this year is that he will score around 30 to 40 points
Wednesday, September 10, 2008
Overview of the summer in the NHL
This is a small summary of my observations about the nhl free agent hunt that started july first 08. i didnt cover all the signings and didnt update it to add the other major contract signing like Chris Chelios or Joe Sakic, but its still an interesting read.
on july first the free agents hunt started in the nhl.
after a couple of big trades during the draft that surprised many. (olli jokinen in phoenix, alex tanguay in montreal etc etc) the best had yet to come.
many of these trades are worth mentionning and i wanted to create a thread just for that even if not many people beside kip will careill start with the trades concerning montreal
Alex tanguay: Alex tanguay is the perfect guy we needed, we needed a star winger that can score a minimum of 30 goals, a really talented guy, not just some good or decent player an dwe finally found it in Alex tanguay who once said he didnt wanna play in montreal (that mightve changed since we finished first in the conference last season). He's also a francophone which is something that always pleases the fans Hes gonna continue to add to the team renown speed as well as be a player that can control the puck well in the offensive zone, something that you can never have too much. Its gonna relief alot of pressure off of kovalev's back so that he can get more room to perform, or the opposite kovalev could drawn all the defensive attention while tanguay gets to play against suckier defensemen and has enough room to demonstrate his talent
Acquiring the rights to sign mats sundin. its unfortunate that sundin isnt certain if he wants to continue his career, but bob gainey improves his popularity by trying hard to get another established star in the team, a Big 6"5 center is always useful in a team and sundin has been an example of consistency throughout his career.
Signing George Laraque. omg its george laraque, one of the best and most feared fighter in the league, at 6"3 and 260 pound (aprox) and the talent to score goals when he gets used that way in a team (unlikely here in montreal) Laraque is one of the best plumber a team ccan have. its gonna be good to defend our young talented players and mostly our promising goaltender Carey Price. Carey has been pushed around alot last year by opposing teams and while Komisarek can push and kick everybody's ass, hes too talented to take stupid penalties cause we need our defensemen to kill the penalties. so having a guy that we just dont care about to go intimidate the enemy team is good. then we could use Laraque every once in a while to go stand in front of the enemy goaltender to block the view. Laraque is also a francohpone that is known for being really active in the community which is something montreal fans will really love about him.
Signing marc denis, Marc denis was once the blue jackets starting goalie, he would play 70+ games per season and perform good, he was the Blue jackets martin brodeur. but this changed once denis left the jackets to play for tampa where he had a disastrous trip. hes been sucking alot since he was in tampa not performing well (we could blame coach john tortorella for that because he tends to be really hard on his players and doesnt shy down to blame goalies)Denis has the talent to be a starting goaltender he just needs to find his focus again and montreal his giving him that chance. He brings experience to our team as well as be a good competitor for Carey price who will need to perform in order to remain the starter. Also renowned Montreal Goalie coach Roland Melanson will surely help Denis improve as a goaltender. Finally, marc denis is a another francophone something to make the fan rejoyce.
This is what concerns montreal, so far the next season looks really promising as most teams from our division hasnt improved much while we did, lets just hope the chemestry follows and everybody keeps up with the hard work. But we can ahve high expectation as young players mature, and coach guy carbonneau gains experience
Other trades:
Rangers sign markus naslund: Wow another star player for the rangers, last year they signed the 2 really wanted center Scott gomez and Chris drury and now they are adding a really talented 40+ goal scorer to a team that had pretty good offensive talent with Jaromir Jagr and Brendan Shanahan
Rob blake with the sharks: Possibly one of the top defensemen in the league along wiht Scott niedermayer and chris pronger, rob blake is getting old but is still a really pro 6"5 defenseman with one heck of a slap shot. This spring the sharks fixed they offensive defenseman problem by trading with the sabres to get Brian campbell. but thye lost it this week to the free agents, so they signed rob blake to bring a ton of experience to the really young sharks defensive squad.
We trade Grabovski to the leafs. lol this winter grabovski was burning through the AHL by scoring like 15 points in 3 games or something retarded, we called him up to the big team, he played the first game, then we scratched him for the 2nd game to let another bigger play (because we needed the physical aspect for that game) and he got pissed and didnt take the plane with the team to protest cause hes a baby like that. needless to say he had played his last match with the team and now he will play with the rival team, lets hope he gets his chance there
Kristian huselius goes to the Blue jackets: Huselius is like the most underrated player in the league, he can score 90 points in a season easely and for once he gets the recognition he deserve with a pretty big salary.
Sean avery to the Dallas stars: That guy is a fag and should be removed from the league, the fact that hes now in the western conference is making me happy cause we dont see/hear from him as much
Doug Weight with the islanders. The islanders could really use better centers, last season was really deceiving for them (Best scorer in the team had 49 points and was center Mike comrie), Comrie is good, but hes not your best center, he probably didnt have enough working room to perform and Weight might be able to help that, hes one of the greater playmakers this league have seen and he can bring alot of experience to the young and crappy islanders and more importantly leadership to assist captain Bill guerin who became the team captain right after signing with the islanders and learned it on the TV as his little daughter was like "daddy youre on tv". he probably was like "lol wtf.." and had a pretty bad season in terms of goal production, if Doug weight can feed him nicely perhaps we can see the islanders in the playoffs
Tampa bay get Olaf kolzig. Tampa always had a problem with having a good goaltender and ever since they won the cup with nikolai khabibulin they have had really bad goaltenders. and now they get Kolzig, who is one of the best goalie in the league but is getting older and older unfortunately. the 6"3 german south african goalie can still play good and is known to perform better when he gets more shot (he won so many games wit hthe capitals when they would be outshot like 50 to 25)
Mark streit with the islanders for 4,5 million. Streit gave great services to montreal playing as both a defensemen and a forward, his decent slap shot made our powerplay really good this season. But the small swiss guy has no talent, and we used to pay him 500k a year and it was fine. but now that he scored an impressive 62 points last year being fed by our star defensemen Andrei markov, his value went up alot and he managed to snag a huge contract from the islanders. hes not worth half of it but hes still a good addition to the islanders cause they needed a guy that cn play on the powerplay
The blackhawks got Brian campbell. Brian campbell is a very good mobile defensemen and the hawks needed one REALLY badly to assist young duncan keith who is fast, but doenst have the experience recquired to defend well. having campbell there is gonna help the team offense alotThe hawks also got Cristobal Huet, our ex goaltender, who is pretty good but never played more than like 45 games in a season which makes his consistency questionnable, hes good tho and if the blackhawks keep khabibulin then the russian might have some pressure to keep his starting spot as the French goaltender performs well
Michael Ryder goes to the bruins, Ryder scored 30 goal in 2 seasons with montreal but always kinda sucked and all of his goals were kinda lucky, this year he didnt perform well at all and was scratched most of the season cause of it, he has some talent and improved some over the year, but he doenst have the heart and the perseverance to put enough efforts while playing. After his really disastrous season he was able to get actualyl more money than he used to get in MTL by signing with boston. he went from 3,2 mil to 4 mil (thats really odd to pay 4 mil for a guy that didnt play half the season and scored 14 goals but yea whatever good for him)
Rangers sign wade redden, Wade redden is one of the better offensive defensemen in the league and what really hurt hte rangers scoring this year was teh fact that they didnt have a good defensemen to launch the attacks or do great passes (Roszival had that role and hes kinda bad) with Redden, it will make all the forwards look better
Oilers trade Joni Pitkanen for Erik Cole. That is good because the oilers could really use a really good starting winger and they could give away their big defensemen since they have Sheldon Souray who can be that big defensemen with the crazy slapshot. Pitkanen is also the piece of puzzle that the hurricanes needed. The canes always had pretty good offense but their defense was always bad and since they traded the big Mike commodore this spring, they needed another big defensemen. Plus, pitkanen can play on the powerplay
Brian Rolston and bobby holik go back to New jersey, These 2 guys used to be key pieces to the new jersey successes and now they are back, which is good cause nj is kinda weak in the center positio ncurrently, the only problem is that these 2 guys are kinda old now and they paid alot of money for em (5 mil per season for rolston and 2,5 a year for holik). Rolston can score alot of goals and the money spent coudl be justified, but holik is too slow and all he can do is win faceoffs and have a really mean look on his face.
Patrick lalime quits the hawks to go to the Sabres, Lalime used to be the starting goalie for the senators and was REALLY good, but ever since he left ottawa, hes had alot of troubles, i dont expect any change with the sabres, but we might have him cause us some troubles during the regular season as quebec goaltender tend to perfor mbetter vs the habs (most of the type we were shut out last season was against quebec goaltenders that werent starters for their respective teams)
Jose theodore sign with the Capitals for like 5 million a year. thats retarded, he had horrible times ever since he got his big contract with montreal and was just a burden for the Avalanche, but he ended the year nicely last year and played well toward the end perhaps it raised his value enough, either way the caps paid too much and it might not be the greatest move from their part
Marek zidlicky to minneseota. i dont know how important zidlicky was in nashville, but it soudned like he was an important piece of that defensive squad and he joins a team that has a good defensive aspect something that coach Jacque Lemaire enforces. Is zidlicky good enough defensively for Lemaire's standards? we will see, hes still a really good addition to the team if look at it in offensive terms
Radim Vrbata signs with tampa bay. wow another pretty good deal for tampa, vrbata is very underrated and can perform pretty well, it will replace the whole left by Ian Hlavac who was traded to nashville last year.
Curtis Joseph returns to toronto. thats good for him, hes like 43 years old now and he gets the chance to play with the team where he spent most of his career with
on july first the free agents hunt started in the nhl.
after a couple of big trades during the draft that surprised many. (olli jokinen in phoenix, alex tanguay in montreal etc etc) the best had yet to come.
many of these trades are worth mentionning and i wanted to create a thread just for that even if not many people beside kip will careill start with the trades concerning montreal
Alex tanguay: Alex tanguay is the perfect guy we needed, we needed a star winger that can score a minimum of 30 goals, a really talented guy, not just some good or decent player an dwe finally found it in Alex tanguay who once said he didnt wanna play in montreal (that mightve changed since we finished first in the conference last season). He's also a francophone which is something that always pleases the fans Hes gonna continue to add to the team renown speed as well as be a player that can control the puck well in the offensive zone, something that you can never have too much. Its gonna relief alot of pressure off of kovalev's back so that he can get more room to perform, or the opposite kovalev could drawn all the defensive attention while tanguay gets to play against suckier defensemen and has enough room to demonstrate his talent
Acquiring the rights to sign mats sundin. its unfortunate that sundin isnt certain if he wants to continue his career, but bob gainey improves his popularity by trying hard to get another established star in the team, a Big 6"5 center is always useful in a team and sundin has been an example of consistency throughout his career.
Signing George Laraque. omg its george laraque, one of the best and most feared fighter in the league, at 6"3 and 260 pound (aprox) and the talent to score goals when he gets used that way in a team (unlikely here in montreal) Laraque is one of the best plumber a team ccan have. its gonna be good to defend our young talented players and mostly our promising goaltender Carey Price. Carey has been pushed around alot last year by opposing teams and while Komisarek can push and kick everybody's ass, hes too talented to take stupid penalties cause we need our defensemen to kill the penalties. so having a guy that we just dont care about to go intimidate the enemy team is good. then we could use Laraque every once in a while to go stand in front of the enemy goaltender to block the view. Laraque is also a francohpone that is known for being really active in the community which is something montreal fans will really love about him.
Signing marc denis, Marc denis was once the blue jackets starting goalie, he would play 70+ games per season and perform good, he was the Blue jackets martin brodeur. but this changed once denis left the jackets to play for tampa where he had a disastrous trip. hes been sucking alot since he was in tampa not performing well (we could blame coach john tortorella for that because he tends to be really hard on his players and doesnt shy down to blame goalies)Denis has the talent to be a starting goaltender he just needs to find his focus again and montreal his giving him that chance. He brings experience to our team as well as be a good competitor for Carey price who will need to perform in order to remain the starter. Also renowned Montreal Goalie coach Roland Melanson will surely help Denis improve as a goaltender. Finally, marc denis is a another francophone something to make the fan rejoyce.
This is what concerns montreal, so far the next season looks really promising as most teams from our division hasnt improved much while we did, lets just hope the chemestry follows and everybody keeps up with the hard work. But we can ahve high expectation as young players mature, and coach guy carbonneau gains experience
Other trades:
Rangers sign markus naslund: Wow another star player for the rangers, last year they signed the 2 really wanted center Scott gomez and Chris drury and now they are adding a really talented 40+ goal scorer to a team that had pretty good offensive talent with Jaromir Jagr and Brendan Shanahan
Rob blake with the sharks: Possibly one of the top defensemen in the league along wiht Scott niedermayer and chris pronger, rob blake is getting old but is still a really pro 6"5 defenseman with one heck of a slap shot. This spring the sharks fixed they offensive defenseman problem by trading with the sabres to get Brian campbell. but thye lost it this week to the free agents, so they signed rob blake to bring a ton of experience to the really young sharks defensive squad.
We trade Grabovski to the leafs. lol this winter grabovski was burning through the AHL by scoring like 15 points in 3 games or something retarded, we called him up to the big team, he played the first game, then we scratched him for the 2nd game to let another bigger play (because we needed the physical aspect for that game) and he got pissed and didnt take the plane with the team to protest cause hes a baby like that. needless to say he had played his last match with the team and now he will play with the rival team, lets hope he gets his chance there
Kristian huselius goes to the Blue jackets: Huselius is like the most underrated player in the league, he can score 90 points in a season easely and for once he gets the recognition he deserve with a pretty big salary.
Sean avery to the Dallas stars: That guy is a fag and should be removed from the league, the fact that hes now in the western conference is making me happy cause we dont see/hear from him as much
Doug Weight with the islanders. The islanders could really use better centers, last season was really deceiving for them (Best scorer in the team had 49 points and was center Mike comrie), Comrie is good, but hes not your best center, he probably didnt have enough working room to perform and Weight might be able to help that, hes one of the greater playmakers this league have seen and he can bring alot of experience to the young and crappy islanders and more importantly leadership to assist captain Bill guerin who became the team captain right after signing with the islanders and learned it on the TV as his little daughter was like "daddy youre on tv". he probably was like "lol wtf.." and had a pretty bad season in terms of goal production, if Doug weight can feed him nicely perhaps we can see the islanders in the playoffs
Tampa bay get Olaf kolzig. Tampa always had a problem with having a good goaltender and ever since they won the cup with nikolai khabibulin they have had really bad goaltenders. and now they get Kolzig, who is one of the best goalie in the league but is getting older and older unfortunately. the 6"3 german south african goalie can still play good and is known to perform better when he gets more shot (he won so many games wit hthe capitals when they would be outshot like 50 to 25)
Mark streit with the islanders for 4,5 million. Streit gave great services to montreal playing as both a defensemen and a forward, his decent slap shot made our powerplay really good this season. But the small swiss guy has no talent, and we used to pay him 500k a year and it was fine. but now that he scored an impressive 62 points last year being fed by our star defensemen Andrei markov, his value went up alot and he managed to snag a huge contract from the islanders. hes not worth half of it but hes still a good addition to the islanders cause they needed a guy that cn play on the powerplay
The blackhawks got Brian campbell. Brian campbell is a very good mobile defensemen and the hawks needed one REALLY badly to assist young duncan keith who is fast, but doenst have the experience recquired to defend well. having campbell there is gonna help the team offense alotThe hawks also got Cristobal Huet, our ex goaltender, who is pretty good but never played more than like 45 games in a season which makes his consistency questionnable, hes good tho and if the blackhawks keep khabibulin then the russian might have some pressure to keep his starting spot as the French goaltender performs well
Michael Ryder goes to the bruins, Ryder scored 30 goal in 2 seasons with montreal but always kinda sucked and all of his goals were kinda lucky, this year he didnt perform well at all and was scratched most of the season cause of it, he has some talent and improved some over the year, but he doenst have the heart and the perseverance to put enough efforts while playing. After his really disastrous season he was able to get actualyl more money than he used to get in MTL by signing with boston. he went from 3,2 mil to 4 mil (thats really odd to pay 4 mil for a guy that didnt play half the season and scored 14 goals but yea whatever good for him)
Rangers sign wade redden, Wade redden is one of the better offensive defensemen in the league and what really hurt hte rangers scoring this year was teh fact that they didnt have a good defensemen to launch the attacks or do great passes (Roszival had that role and hes kinda bad) with Redden, it will make all the forwards look better
Oilers trade Joni Pitkanen for Erik Cole. That is good because the oilers could really use a really good starting winger and they could give away their big defensemen since they have Sheldon Souray who can be that big defensemen with the crazy slapshot. Pitkanen is also the piece of puzzle that the hurricanes needed. The canes always had pretty good offense but their defense was always bad and since they traded the big Mike commodore this spring, they needed another big defensemen. Plus, pitkanen can play on the powerplay
Brian Rolston and bobby holik go back to New jersey, These 2 guys used to be key pieces to the new jersey successes and now they are back, which is good cause nj is kinda weak in the center positio ncurrently, the only problem is that these 2 guys are kinda old now and they paid alot of money for em (5 mil per season for rolston and 2,5 a year for holik). Rolston can score alot of goals and the money spent coudl be justified, but holik is too slow and all he can do is win faceoffs and have a really mean look on his face.
Patrick lalime quits the hawks to go to the Sabres, Lalime used to be the starting goalie for the senators and was REALLY good, but ever since he left ottawa, hes had alot of troubles, i dont expect any change with the sabres, but we might have him cause us some troubles during the regular season as quebec goaltender tend to perfor mbetter vs the habs (most of the type we were shut out last season was against quebec goaltenders that werent starters for their respective teams)
Jose theodore sign with the Capitals for like 5 million a year. thats retarded, he had horrible times ever since he got his big contract with montreal and was just a burden for the Avalanche, but he ended the year nicely last year and played well toward the end perhaps it raised his value enough, either way the caps paid too much and it might not be the greatest move from their part
Marek zidlicky to minneseota. i dont know how important zidlicky was in nashville, but it soudned like he was an important piece of that defensive squad and he joins a team that has a good defensive aspect something that coach Jacque Lemaire enforces. Is zidlicky good enough defensively for Lemaire's standards? we will see, hes still a really good addition to the team if look at it in offensive terms
Radim Vrbata signs with tampa bay. wow another pretty good deal for tampa, vrbata is very underrated and can perform pretty well, it will replace the whole left by Ian Hlavac who was traded to nashville last year.
Curtis Joseph returns to toronto. thats good for him, hes like 43 years old now and he gets the chance to play with the team where he spent most of his career with
purepwnage
this site is about a little web tv show featuring gamers. while its main objective is to be funny their latest episode intro movie caught my attention. Heres what i wrote about it few weeks ago:
season 2 ep 5 came out recently, the whole show changed quite a bit over time but i still enjoy it
before every show they always do a little video with stuff that have nothing to do aobut the show and this time it was an interesting critic about the current gamesbasically critisizing the massive amount of single player console games we have, for 60$ that give you 10-15 hours of play time. while you can go watch a movie and pay 10$ or just read a book.how the targetted audience for games is larger and theres more "noobs" tha nbefore to satisfy and that kinda dumb games down.i found it pretty interesting, even if it was disguised into something that didnt look serious in the video.
I mean its true, my friend has a ps3 and sometimes we rent games, but were trying to play the mutiplayer games or the ones with co-op stories because this coop mode stories is what we cannot get with pc games, but theres not many games out there, its all single player games. for PC its a bit different, most games have a multiplayer mode, but very few are actually played by a lot of people right now. look at UT3, ET:QW, Q4 to only name those.and then the dumbing game down thing, many people that played aoc were mostly excited aobut it cause of the hardcore factor, it was aimed at hardcore players, same for vanguard, theres a real demand for these games, but theres nothing for them except Horrible games. then you can also think of games that are becoming simpler to accomodate that larger audience thats appearantly noob, think of the NGE in SWG, or the recent Buffs to pve skills in GW (thankfully GW does that well so it doesnt break PvP at all) and theres several more examples of games that are accessible now to people that arent that good of gamers
We havent seen any good competitive game since CoD1, everybody is playing really old games still because they are the best at that even if they look by crap to today's standard.really i dont know whats going on or what will happen in general with the gaming industry as the better players are seeking good competitive games and they constantly get games that arent all that good because developpers seem to be trying to satisfy the masses
lucky tie
for his birthday last year, montreal canadiens headcoach's wife decided to offer a nice gife to her husband. a tie. it was orange with some burgundy designs and other really ugly colored things. she paid 150$ for one of the ugliest tie ever. even don cherry wouldnt wear it.
The first time Guy Carbonneau wore it was in a game against the NY rangers. the habs were losing 4-1 in the 3rd period. Mike komisarek was going rampage on everyone tackling everything in could and trying to get in fight, to try and give some momemtum to his team. eventually it paid off and montreal started working on their come back, they scored 4 unanswered goals to win 5-4 in OT. one of the most memorable season game i saw.
The first game of the playoffs the habs won fairly easely against the bruins as Carbonneau was still wearing his really ugly tie. Boston battled and managed to tie the series and force a Game 7. For this occasion Guy had to wear his lucky tie and test its power and see if he could win a game 7. He did. there was riots in montreal and nobody doubted the power of the tie
game 6 against philadelphia, the habs are trailing 3-2 in the series and need to win to force a game 7. Flyers winger RJ umberger already scored 7 goals in the past 5 games against montreal and needs to be stopped. This is when Carbonneau decided to pull out his tie. but for the first time, it failed, umberger scored his 8th goal of the series and helped the flyers win.
Anyway while the ugly tie wasnt perfect it still became legendary and carbonneau promised to auction it and offer the money to charity.
and today at the annual montreal canadiens golf tournament, the tie sold for 100 000$
The first time Guy Carbonneau wore it was in a game against the NY rangers. the habs were losing 4-1 in the 3rd period. Mike komisarek was going rampage on everyone tackling everything in could and trying to get in fight, to try and give some momemtum to his team. eventually it paid off and montreal started working on their come back, they scored 4 unanswered goals to win 5-4 in OT. one of the most memorable season game i saw.
The first game of the playoffs the habs won fairly easely against the bruins as Carbonneau was still wearing his really ugly tie. Boston battled and managed to tie the series and force a Game 7. For this occasion Guy had to wear his lucky tie and test its power and see if he could win a game 7. He did. there was riots in montreal and nobody doubted the power of the tie
game 6 against philadelphia, the habs are trailing 3-2 in the series and need to win to force a game 7. Flyers winger RJ umberger already scored 7 goals in the past 5 games against montreal and needs to be stopped. This is when Carbonneau decided to pull out his tie. but for the first time, it failed, umberger scored his 8th goal of the series and helped the flyers win.
Anyway while the ugly tie wasnt perfect it still became legendary and carbonneau promised to auction it and offer the money to charity.
and today at the annual montreal canadiens golf tournament, the tie sold for 100 000$
Tuesday, September 9, 2008
People that think electronic music sucks
How many times do you hear people saying "Electronic music sucks cause it always sounds the same" well heres the part of a conversation I had with my friend on this topic
21:36] #kom.vendeTTa: that's why it annoys me with people that are like OMG ELECTROINC IS SO ANNOYING IT'S ALL THE SAME SOUND
[21:36] #kom.Pako: yea me 2
[21:37] #kom.Pako: but the other day while listening to a cd in the car (While we were driving to quebec city) i was like wtf all we hear is the drums
[21:37] #kom.Pako: and its all the same
[21:37] #kom.vendeTTa: so i'm like well if your mental aptitude for music appreciation wasn't so shallow you'd hear that it's the melody and composition of a song that makes it good and not what instrument is used
[21:37] #kom.Pako: i was aggravated
[21:37] #kom.vendeTTa: lol
[21:37] #kom.vendeTTa: what kind of music?
[21:37] #kom.Pako: a progressive cd i made
[21:37] #kom.Pako: wit hsome of my fav prog songs
[21:37] #kom.vendeTTa: ah
[21:37] #kom.Pako: but i could hardly recognize them
[21:38] #kom.Pako: cause all i heard was the drums
[21:38] #kom.Pako: and i wasl ike well no wonder people dont like it when its what they hear
[21:39] #kom.Pako: do you ahve the song Saburan Nights from Johhn juribers
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=253lT08BOBw&feature=related
21:40] #kom.Pako: that was playing in the car and it was kinda low volume and i wasnt able to recognize it until 5 minutes in
[21:40] #kom.Pako: but when you hear other things tha njust the drums its a really good song imo
[21:41] #kom.Pako: but i figure in clubs and all, theres alot of emphasis on the bass
[21:41] #kom.vendeTTa: yeah
[21:41] #kom.Pako: and sometimes you cant always hear the fine sounds well
[21:41] #kom.Pako: and thats the problem when it comes ot promoting electronic music
[21:43] #kom.Pako: people only hear it from clubs or cars
[21:43] #kom.Pako: while the best place to hear it would be on a computer or with a good sound system in a house
The example provided in that conversation is only 1 small example of songs that can sounds like crap if heard in a club or in car with "really freaking good subwooffer that can play music at 150 decibel and kill small fishes using only that". Too many times people miss out on the fine soundings that make a good electronic song
Mats Sundin
All summer long, several NHL clubs waited for Mats Sundin to take a decision wether he's gonan continue playing or simply retire. This caused a lot of drama in Montreal since Bob Gainey gained exclusive rights to negociate with Sundin a bit before july first.
He still hasn't decided if he was gonna play, but in my opinion it won't matter if he signs with the Montreal Canadiens or not, we already have a good club and he would simply be a bonus.
But I particularly said what Gainey told him when he spoke to him in a last attempt to convince him to sign "If you wanna retire, go ahead, if youre not sure, play and the emotions will follow"
I thought it was great, because if Sundin really thought he didn't want to continue he couldve done it a while ago. but he's still uncertain and it looks like hes got a lot of good hockey to play and can help teams really well still even at 38 years old. Last season he managed to score over 70 points while playing for one of the worse team in the eastern conference. he was the only guy doing and able to do anything and he kept delivering. He has been a symbol of consistency throughout his career and it would be a shame to see him go like this, while he was uncertain about his future
He still hasn't decided if he was gonna play, but in my opinion it won't matter if he signs with the Montreal Canadiens or not, we already have a good club and he would simply be a bonus.
But I particularly said what Gainey told him when he spoke to him in a last attempt to convince him to sign "If you wanna retire, go ahead, if youre not sure, play and the emotions will follow"
I thought it was great, because if Sundin really thought he didn't want to continue he couldve done it a while ago. but he's still uncertain and it looks like hes got a lot of good hockey to play and can help teams really well still even at 38 years old. Last season he managed to score over 70 points while playing for one of the worse team in the eastern conference. he was the only guy doing and able to do anything and he kept delivering. He has been a symbol of consistency throughout his career and it would be a shame to see him go like this, while he was uncertain about his future
Movie review - Death Racers
So I went to see the movie Death Racers with my friends, I had no idea what it was but from what my friends told me I was expecting something cool but not good with good special effects and shitty story.
The movie starts and theres some little text explaining the context of the movie "In 2012, the economy crashes, everybody is poor and there's no jobs, jails are now controlled by private companies instead of government"
At that point, I'm thinking well this is gonna suck, they just throw the story on there without really bringing them and building it.
The movie is about prisoners that do death racing to win their freedom, they drive really powerful armored cars that are equipped we big weapons and they drive in a circuit that has powerups (offensive weapons, defensive weapons). To me it was really similar to Unreal Tournament, the video game thats renowned for its deathmatch mode where people just kill themselves in an area using powerups to gain an advantage. But Unreal tournament was never renowned for good stories. I was thinking, well Death Racers is gonna suck big time.
In a way the story did suck, but there was some good action and special effects. But when you take a closer look, the story is a lot more interesting than it looks. Why, well they are critisizing the masses being mesmerized by violent content and the entertainment industry to keep them entertained and ignoring more important matters that concern thems directly such as economy and politics thus allowing the elite to have a greater grasp on the world to enforce their will.
The movie starts and theres some little text explaining the context of the movie "In 2012, the economy crashes, everybody is poor and there's no jobs, jails are now controlled by private companies instead of government"
At that point, I'm thinking well this is gonna suck, they just throw the story on there without really bringing them and building it.
The movie is about prisoners that do death racing to win their freedom, they drive really powerful armored cars that are equipped we big weapons and they drive in a circuit that has powerups (offensive weapons, defensive weapons). To me it was really similar to Unreal Tournament, the video game thats renowned for its deathmatch mode where people just kill themselves in an area using powerups to gain an advantage. But Unreal tournament was never renowned for good stories. I was thinking, well Death Racers is gonna suck big time.
In a way the story did suck, but there was some good action and special effects. But when you take a closer look, the story is a lot more interesting than it looks. Why, well they are critisizing the masses being mesmerized by violent content and the entertainment industry to keep them entertained and ignoring more important matters that concern thems directly such as economy and politics thus allowing the elite to have a greater grasp on the world to enforce their will.
My blog is born
So I decided to create a blog today. I decided to do that mainly cause I noticed I can write huge wall of texts about many things if I want tho just venting my opinion and I thought that it could be interesting to just make those opinions available for anyone to read.
So starting from now, I will post entries about different subjects that interest me. I will touch many subjects ranging from MMOs, sports, video games, social observations, political or economical conjectures analysis, entries about songs I like and maybe even some real life drama to spice things up.
So starting from now, I will post entries about different subjects that interest me. I will touch many subjects ranging from MMOs, sports, video games, social observations, political or economical conjectures analysis, entries about songs I like and maybe even some real life drama to spice things up.
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